Page:The Strand Magazine (Volume 3).djvu/497



R. JONES!"

It was the housemaid announcing a visitor at a somewhat unusual hour. We were just sitting down to luncheon, I having done a pretty fair morning's work with the prospect of a long night in the House of Commons. The name of the caller was not unfamiliar, but I did not care to see him just then.

"Say I'm engaged, and ask him if he'll be good enough to write."

The maid was back again in a few minutes. Mr. Jones was not in any hurry. He would wait. As for his business, that was indefinite, only he was sure I would not know him. Piqued by the mystery that surrounded the caller, I asked what he was like. "Was he a gentleman?"

"Well, sir," answered the maid, cautiously, "he wears a straw hat."

That seemed in some degree conclusive, straw hats not being usual amongst habitués of the West-end in the height of the London season. However, if Mr. Jones had so much leisure that he could hang about a staircase whilst someone who would not know him when he saw him was eating his luncheon, that was his affair.

I had forgotten all about Mr. Jones when I opened the hall door to go forth. He was recalled to my mind by the discovery of a straw hat on a level with the landing. At first it seemed to be floating there, but at another glance I discovered a figure under it. It was evidently Mr. Jones, who was standing half a dozen steps down the staircase, reflectively gazing at the far-away basement. At the sound of the closing door he turned and looked up at me with curious inquiring gaze, which presently broadened into a smile. He said nothing, nor did I. After all, it mightn't be Mr. Jones, though there was the straw hat. If it were, I had never been introduced to him, and it is an Englishman's inalienable privilege in such circumstances, not only to keep silence, but to look with a certain amount of suspicion at the stranger.

Mr. Jones had no such scruples. "Good morning," he said, slowly mounting the steps, and fixing me with a glittering, beady eye.

"Good morning," I replied, not to be led into ambush by the friendliness of his smile.